Weaning Myself Off Facebook

But I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss Facebook. I do. I miss the Virtual Reality group and all the Second Life groups, especially Second Life Friends, which was always good for a debate or a chuckle. And I know that there are certain acquaintances whom I will lose touch with. Hardly any of my former Facebook friends followed me over to the #facebook-friends channel I set up on the RyanSchultz.com Discord server.

But I remain steadfast in my decision to quit Facebook. The company has allowed some morally dodgy things to be done on its social network, and I refuse to continue to passively support Facebook by staying a part of it. I’m only one person, but if enough other people get similarly fed up and decide to leave, maybe the company will make more ethical decisions. But I doubt it.

Mark Zuckerberg and his team have been so focused on aggressive growth that they’ve blinded themselves to what a threat to society Facebook has become. No one company should have so much power. No company deserves so much power.

The only possible problem my decision may cause in future is if/when Facebook launches a new social VR platform which requires a Facebook account to access, like Facebook Spaces. It’s still theoretically possible that Facebook could launch a new product (or strike a partnership with an existing metaverse company). My worst nightmare would be Facebook buying up High Fidelity, VRChat or even Linden Lab.

One way to fight back against the Facebook juggernaut is to do what I have done: create my own personalized communities using tools like WordPress and Discord. It’s a drop in the bucket compared to the over 2 billion people on Facebook. But it’s a start. I’d like to think that I am reclaiming a small part of my personal freedom.